Strongman

by Matt Briggs

An Army Reservist, Ben Wallace, is a reluctant member of the U.S. Army

Reserve. Yet, when he is called to duty in Operation Desert Shield, he realizes

he wants to experience what his grandfather calls, “The Enlightenment of War.”

He initially joined the Army as a form of rebellion against his father–a Vietnam

era draft dodger–and as a way to be closer to his grandfather. His grandfather

is a veteran of Guam. Wallace needs to experience combat, he thinks, to make

himself a man.




Several things make this unlikely. Wallace is, first of all, a Laboratory Technician

in a General Hospital. Second of all, every aspect of modern warfare isolates the

soldiers from the discomforts and realities of the conflict. They have comfortable

uniforms made from hi-tech microfibers, access to phones to call home at any

time, rations designed by master chefs.




Wallace also becomes entangled in the schemes of a profiteering sergeant, Philip

Mice. Mice needs Wallace, for his physical strength, to defeat a rival sergeant

and to manage the enlisted men while Mice establishes a business trading in

contraband. When the hospital arrives in Saudi Arabia, Mice sets up a thriving

trade in homebrewed beer, used furniture, and bacon. The trade deals in comfort

items designed to alleviate what little discomfort that remains among the soldiers.




When Wallace and Mice and finally dispose of the rival sergeant, Wallace realizes

Mice will never arrange for Wallace’s transfer to a field hospital near the front

lines as long as he remains useful to him. When Wallace threatens to turn himself

over to the MPs, Mice quickly transfers Wallace to a field hospital. Following

the First Infantry’s advance on Basra, Wallace encounters his first surrendered

Iraqis. The persistent unreality of the American Army’s war begins to slip away.

When he faces the remains of retreating Iraqi soldiers destroyed on the highway

to Basra, he finally experiences “The Enlightenment of War,” even though at

this point he would rather remain unenlightened.

266 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 1, 2025

About the author

Matt Briggs grew up in the Snoqualmie Valley, raised by working-class, counter-culture parents who cultivated and sold cannabis. Briggs has written two books set in rural Washington chronicling this life, The Remains of River Names and Shoot the Buffalo. Critic Ann Powers wrote of Briggs first book in the New York Times Book Review, "Briggs has captured the America that neither progressives nor family-value advocates want to think about, where bohemianism has degenerated into dangerous dropping out." Briggs has published a number of collection of stories, including The Moss Gatherers and The End is the Beginning. Of his stories, Jim Feast wrote in the American Book Review, "All of Briggs’s zigzagging stories are told with great attention to the details of lowbrow culture and the contours of the American Northwest."